Five Things Running: Issue #29

I ran along the Heidschnuckenweg on Sunday.

Last week you learned the German word Muskelkater and this week I have a new word for you to learn: Heidschnuckenweg. The “beauty” of the German language is that we can just add a number of words together and create new words. Obviously those words can get rather long and might look at bit intimidating at first. So let’s have a look at Heidschnuckenweg. The first word is Heide, and we convienently forget the e, which means heath. Schnucken is the plural of Schnucke and that is another word for sheep, but it could also mean cutie. And weg is way. So this is the Heathsheepway. The Heidschnuckenweg is a trail that starts at the outskirts of Hamburg in the Fischbeker Heide, which is a beautiful heathland and spans all the way down to Celle, some 223 km South of Hamburg. The Heidschnuckenweg covers a large area of heathland located in the heart of Lower Saxony. One could also say that there is just nothing, except for heath and sheep. Anyhow, on Sunday I ran the first leg of the Heidschnuckenweg from the start in Hamburg to Buchholz in der Nordheide (Buchholz in the Northern Heath), which is some 28 km. The run was pretty fun, but I didn’t see any sheep, just heathland, forests, an Autobahn, horses and some cattle.

This is why I run: to experience wonderful mornings, surrounded by beautiful and tranquil nature. It was nice and crisp and sunny this morning, around 15 degrees Celsius, which is a great temperature for running.

The other, probably a bit bigger news of the day: Tigist Assefa shattered the Marathon World Record by a little more than 2 minutes during the Berlin Marathon. She wore the $500 shoes that Adidas just announced: the Adidas Adizero Adios Pro Evo 1. So I guess those shoes are pretty well designed. I’m waiting for the trail version to drop.

And now for something completely different: five years ago I bought a pair of Darn Tough running socks at REI. These were by far my favorite socks, I ran in them a lot. Then they started to fall apart at the seams. I remembered the Darn Tough lifelong guarantee, but the process was to complicated for me (I had to fill out a form and mail the socks to a distributor in Germany, too many steps involved for my little brain…), so I forgot about it and kept running in the socks. A few days ago I noticed Darn Tough now has a European shop as well, so I went to darntough.eu, filed a claim, uploaded a photo of my old socks and immediately got credit for a new pair of socks, which I ordered right away. I ran in them today. They are my new favorite socks. Also, Darn Tough is an amazingly cool brand with great socks. 🏃🏻‍♂️

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These are the Five Things Running you want to read this week:

My Running Club, My Everything

The idea of a running club has a lot of appeal to me. It’s just that I love running alone in the mornings a lot and I also like it that I don’t have to stick to a schedule and can just run when I want to (or when it fits into my schedule). I’ve been following a few running clubs in Hamburg for a while and this does look fun, but so far I lack motivation. Maybe if the merch gets better… (LINK)

Past Athletic Performance Doesn’t Guarantee Future Results

There’s hope if you weren’t the fasted runner in high school or college. Also, if you were fast, there’s no guarantee that you’ll stay fast. Just do it like me: waste a few decades with eating and drinking and not running and then when you start running again, you get constantly better, even above the age of 50 ✌🏻. (LINK)

Running on Social Media

“Social media can be a great facilitator of running friendships, a tool for growing the sport, and a resource for learning about training and racing. But it is a limited tool, with regular distortions and possible pitfalls.” - this is so true and we should keep that in mind when we post our stuff or read about the achievements of others. I oftentimes wish Strava had a thing where you’d post in a different color scheme or so when you’re injured and you can talk about the progress and whatnot and people don’t just think you have disappeared after your last run… (LINK)

The Brutal Wonders of a Late-Summer Run

“Running makes a claim on our entire bodies, and because of the sorts of spiritually restless creatures we are, that claim is most keenly felt in our souls.” - this is a thoughtful essay by

Nick Ripatrazone

on running and the big why behind it. (LINK)

This is what a 200-mile race looks like

“It’s a privilege to choose your own suffering.” - hmm, yes, but I’d limit it a bit more. Still, it’s amazing what the human body and mind can accomplish. (LINK)

That’s all for now!

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